At Sea

July 10^th, 2025

It was another foggy morning, with the foghorn going off every 2 minutes. I wonder if foghorns get worn out if they are used constantly.

I had the sensation that the ship was speeding up. Then Captain Hashmi made the announcement that we had a medical emergency on board, and we were diverting to Louisbourg in Nove Scotia. I thought we would be way out in the Atlantic by now, but apparently not, we were still in reach of the coast of Cape Breton Island.

I looked on Cruise Mapper, and sure enough we had changed course and were heading for Canada again.

It is always so awful when you hear that there is a medical crisis on board. Years ago I thought it would be really cool to be a ship’s doctor. Traveling around the world on an ocean liner. A new port every day. My kind of lifestyle.

Now I am so glad I didn’t follow that career path! Dealing with emergency after emergency in the middle of the ocean, making decisions about when to head back to shore, when to insist that a guest disembarks into some unknown medical facility on some distant shore. That would clearly not work for me.

It is so much better to travel as a guest, and get to participate in all of the wonderful things going on around the ship.

I had initially been very happy that choir practice had been switched to 2:00 PM instead of 1:00 PM. Much better timing if you want to have lunch. Today I was faced with a dilemma. There was a piano recital at 2:00, and this conflicted with choir.

I chose the piano recital, which was a great choice. The pianist was a delightful Welshman, Iwan Llewelyn Jones, who played several of my favorite pieces. He is planning to play some Welsh music at his next performance. I can’t miss that, so I am thinking that this choir business may not work out at all on this crossing.

The fog had lifted by late afternoon, I am sure that would make the medical evacuation easier.

Then land came into sight, and even though we did seem to be quite far away, the ship stopped.

The evacuation took place, and sometime later we saw the Canadian coast guard boat heading back to shore. Then we were once more on our way to Southampton.

Captain Hashmi had reassured us that the detour would not delay our arrival in Southampton. I guess we will find out more about this in his noon announcement tomorrow. Ships should go slower in fog, so I am sure we were behind schedule anyway.

For the first time this voyage, we were able to have sundowners on the balcony. The lifeboats block our view, but they also do a good job of blocking the wind. It was lovely to sit outdoors and sip my Veuve Clicquot, and munch on biltong and cheese and biscuits purloined from the Kings Court.

We also saw our first sunset from the dining room this evening. It was a beautiful sight.

Previously the evening show had been at 10:30. This gave you enough time to have a leisurely dinner and then find a seat in the theater in good time before the show started.

For some obscure reason the evening showtime is now at 10:15. This makes things very rushed towards the end of the meal, and we invariably arrive in the theater just as the show is starting and have to negotiate our way to our seats in the dark.

The early show is at 8:15, so maybe the time change of the show makes it easier for the waitstaff in the dining room to get the tables ready for the late seating guests. Who knows, but it is rather annoying.

We had to grab the first available seats in the theater, so we didn’t really get a good view of Alton Fitzgerald White, but we could hear him sing, and that was wonderful.

He has a long history of performing on Broadway (over 4,000 appearances as Mufasa in the Lion King) and it is easy to see why. He has a wonderful stage presence, and it was a great show.

Another perfect evening on Queen Mary 2